Congressman Joe Barton (R.-TX) is one of the few people from either party in Washington who should have any credibility left with the American public. On June 17, Barton infuriated liberals on Capitol Hill, and throughout the national media, by asserting that Barack Obama’s demand for twenty billion dollars from BP, ostensibly as reparation for its massive oil spill, amounted to a “shakedown” of the company.

Immediately on the heels of feigned liberal hysterics and outrage over Barton’s remarks, prominent members of his own party, including House Minority Leader John Boehner (R.-OH) and Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R.-VA) renounced Barton, insisting that he apologize or face punitive action, including removal from his position as ranking member of the House Energy Committee. The only problem amid all of the overblown sanctimony from across the political spectrum is that in retrospect, Barton was proven to be absolutely right.

His real sin was to highlight the abject hypocrisy, ineptitude, and completely self-serving mindset of the current administration, as well as its flagrant disregard for the plight of the people who make up real America. Barack Obama and his minions have an agenda. If properly managed and exploited, an oil spill would greatly buttress their purpose. And the untold hardship of hundreds of thousands of people living along the Gulf Coast, harmed not by any massive oil slick, but by the ham-fisted indifference of a government regulating their lives and fortunes out of existence, was only so much “collateral damage” that would barely make a ripple on the liberal nightly news.

In the past week, much coverage has been given to the lavish manner in which Michelle Obama has indulged herself and her cadre of friends while on “vacation” in Spain. Yet this sorry episode is merely another indicator of the callous disdain of the Obamas and their kind towards real America. Whether raiding the public coffers of “stimulus” funds to finance their favorite activist “charities,” traipsing off to a luxury resort to play golf or engage in some other diversion (Michelle’s copious trip was certainly not the first), or throwing lavish White House bashes, the Obamas clearly see their situation as an opportunity to live it up at taxpayer expense.

Meanwhile, average workers (those who still are working) suffer under the escalating burden placed on them by the mounting directives and regulatory excesses of a meddlesome and bloated government. More tragic still is the hardship of those whose jobs have been lost, possibly forever, as a result of the abominable economic situation, itself a byproduct of unfettered profligate government spending and interference in the private sector.

Of course the proper response, were the federal government actually interested in improving things, would be to get out of the way and unleash the strength and resourcefulness of the American people. From the reclamation of the Gulf Coast, to the refurbishment of the economy, the fervent and impassioned participation of “Main Street” would provide the necessary manpower and expertise to rectify things.

Just as Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal exhibited far more concern and understanding of the oil spill crisis, and a vastly more effective approach to dealing with it, so could “We the People” address healthcare and jobs with a far greater effectiveness, and without the increased intrusions of the federal government or its exorbitant costs. Unfortunately, to Obama and his cohorts, that is exactly the problem. Given his statist aspirations along with his co-conspirators in the Democrat controlled congress; such a course would be absolutely unacceptable.

The economic downturn of the past few years is only a negative to those who believe they should rightfully be in control of the money they earn through their own sweat and toil. For the socialists who now populate the Democrat Party in Washington the current recession was, as Obama Chief of Staff Rahm Emmanuel so heartlessly asserted “the opportunity for us to do things that we could not do before.”

Ditto for the oil spill. Not only did it initially portend an environmental panic that could be exploited in the effort to pass “cap and trade” (a ruse to seize more taxes in the name of saving the planet), but it provided justification for Obama to illegally confiscate a stimulus sized chunk of cash from another source, this time an evil, wealthy oil company.

Of course we were all reassured that the money would be properly and objectively dispersed by an “independent” third party, Kenneth Feinberg, who also just happens to be Barack Obama’s “Pay Czar.” Empanelling Jack Ruby on the Warren Commission would have constituted a less outrageous conflict of interest. Possessing about as much independence and objectivity as any of the other Obama “czars,” Feinberg can be counted upon to line the pockets of preferred White House causes, while those rubes down south are assuredly going to be left to fend for themselves.

Money equals power, and therefore, control of money equals control of the people. It is for this reason and not any faux concern over the possibility of damage done by wayward oil slicks, that the Obama White House was finally motivated to take action on the Gulf disaster. And by the very nature of that action, looking for all possible means of enriching its coffers while thwarting any real effort by Governor Jindal to improve the lot of his state’s citizens, the current Administration revealed a treacherous devotion to its advancement at the ultimate expense of the American people.

The monies extorted from BP are merely a reflection of the monies being extorted from the hard working and productive people across America. Contrary to any flowery rhetoric appearing on the teleprompters, the real purpose of this theft was never to build a better America, but to further empower its increasingly dictatorial and self-serving government. Until the people wake up to this government’s craven ugliness, and refuse to soft-peddle the magnitude of threat it represents, it will continue unabated in its efforts to subjugate them and their posterity to its insatiable appetite.